The present invention relates to a personal, portable bearing indicator for indicating the bearing to Mecca, or to another religiously significant location, such as Jerusalem for example, during periods of prayer.
Islam is the world's second largest religion, encompassing some 800 million practitioners, known as Muslims. The faith is based upon the teachings and revelations of Mohammed the prophet who lived in the region now known as Saudi Arabia. Muslims believe that the archangel Gabriel descended to earth to give Mohammed the revelation that there is only one God and directed him to clear the Kaaba (a cube-like rock shrine believed to have been erected to God by Abraham) in the city of Mecca of all idols and consecrate it to the worship of the one God. After a period of exile, Mohammed is believed to have returned to Mecca and accomplished Gabriel's directive. In doing so, Mohammed directed all of his followers to hold the Kaaba sacred and dedicated it as the true House of God.
Based upon these beliefs, Islam has developed the tradition of the Haj wherein all of the faithful are expected to visit the holy city of Mecca once during their lives and perform a ritual encompassing about two weeks. In addition to this requirement, Muslims are expected to engage in prayers to Allah, the one God, five times every day. During these prayer periods, Muslims must face in the direction of Mecca and the Kaaba. This direction, from anywhere on earth, is universally known as "Ghebleh".
While this requirement presents no particular problem to Muslims in their customary homes and offices, travelers are constantly faced with the problem of locating the correct bearing for Mecca, sometimes from as many as five different locations in a day. Previously, the traveling Muslim was left either with merely estimating the correct bearing by facing roughly East or West, for example, or by carrying complex tables of latitude/longitude locations which give the bearing of Mecca from any point on Earth. Along with these tables, the traveler must carry an accurate compass to translate the bearing into a proper praying orientation.
At least one attempt (Itoh et al., U.S. Pat. No. 4,763,268) has been made to automate the process, at least for a traveler in an automobile. This complex apparatus requires installation in the automobile and the traveler must enter a map reference based upon 16 different compass direction pie segments irradiating from Mecca. The result is a cumbersome operation which still requires the traveler to have a basic frame of reference derived from a chart. In reality, this system is only good for an area encompassing a radius of a few hundred miles from Mecca. Furthermore, it involves the use of an automobile and requires some rather complex input from the operator, rendering it unsuitable for a relatively unsophisticated user.
It is clear then, that a need exists for a compact, portable, personal bearing indicator apparatus for indicating the correct bearing to Mecca from any desired position. The bearing indicator should be reliable, durable, and capable of operation by someone who is minimally educated and unsophisticated or even illiterate. The apparatus should also incorporate a compass so that the correct orientation of the apparatus relative to magnetic or true north is readily available for calculation and display purposes.